Cardboard Boxes
by Just Yesterday
Summary: ONESHOT, BL on Graduation Day. And then I thought to myself, does Lucas have a box? I mean we spent practiclly every day together for almost eight months. Did I get a box? Or did the stuff just little by little disappear over time? BL mentions LP BC


Title: Cardboard Boxes

Author: D Sollers 

Subject: ONESHOT. It's graduation day for the senior class of Tree Hill and Brooke Davis is leaving her friends and her home behind her. But before she can go, she has one more goodbye. BL. With mentions of LP and BC 

Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with One Tree Hill, nor at this present time would want to. Hello? Have you even watched the show recently. No I didn't think so. 

Author's Notes: I know I have three stories that I have to update. Right now I am reworking one story so that its the same idea, but better quality. Because the way the show has been going, we need all the awesome BL story's we can get our hands on. I am not sure about my other stories, all I can say is that EVENTUALLY they will be finished. I don't like to leave things I've started not finished so I will hopefully get back into them. 

"Are you ready?" 

Brooke Davis stepped out of her closet and placed the final box on her bed. With a sad smile she walked across the room to her boyfriend of only three weeks and wrapped her arms around him. "After all the homes I've lived in... this one is the one I'm going to miss the most." 

Chase nodded his head. "Rachel really came through for you this year, didn't she?" 

Brooke nodded her head. "It's funny. The beginning of senior year I hated her and now I I just wish she was here for graduation." 

"I'm sorry," he said, rubbing her back before placing a kiss on her lips. "We really need to get going, graduation is in a few hours." 

Graduation. 

It seemed surreal to her, that her reign of high school prom queen was over. The friendships she had made, the loves that she had lost would soon be distant memories. 

As would Tree Hill. 

She was leaving in the morning for New York, the city where all her dreams could come true. In less than two weeks she would start her internship with Victoria Secret and college would start in the fall. 

This was how she had chosen it, how she had always dreamed life after high school would have been. When she had chosen the school in New York, she had believed that she would have been heading to the big City with her boyfriend and her best friend in tow. 

Little did she know that fate's decisions were more cruel, her best friend would be going to school in Savannah and her one time boyfriend Lucas would be staying in Tree Hill, alone. 

"Chase, can I meet you there? I have one more thing to do before I leave tomorrow," Brooke explained. 

Chase nodded his head in understanding and he reached down to give her a kiss on her forehead. 

"I'll see you there," he said as he headed for the door. 

He turned around and paused for a moment. 

"I love you Brooke." 

She smiled at his words and nodded her head knowing that he had meant it. With Chase, ever sense they had gotten back together, there had never been any question of his feelings for her. 

He loved her. 

He loved who she was now and had come to accept the girl she was in her past. 

"I know." 

Chase smiled back at her before exiting the room, leaving Brooke deep in thought. She stared down at the suitcases on her bed, filled with clothes and the boxes filled with pictures and books. Glancing around the room, she took in every detail trying to remember anything else she had left to grab. 

And in the corner of her eye, she spotted it. 

The box wedged in the closet that had held her locked away heart. 

She made her way over to the box and carefully lifted it up into her arms. Deciding she had no other choice but to open it, she peeked inside. Pulling out the familiar sweater that laid on top of all of the other items, she brought it up to her nose. 

The lingering smell of Lucas Scott weighed heavily in the room and she sat it down on Rachel's desk. 

Next were a few handwritten letters from him, words that she wondered if he even remembered writing. 

i If he even meant the words he wrote. i 

There were pictures and concert tickets and movie tickets tucked into envelopes, each with special distinct memories of a happier time. Where Brooke Davis felt happier than she could have ever imagined. Back to a time where she was his Pretty Girl and her best friend was nothing more than a friendly confidant. 

There were mix tapes thrown in the box, ones that he had taken hours to prepare for her. At the time she hadn't really played them much. But as the weeks turned into months following their breakup, Brooke Davis found herself paying more and more attention to the things that Lucas and her had been through. 

At the bottom of the box, she found the final letter she had written him, the only letter he never had a chance to read. She wrote it after the basketball banquet, after they both had said words they couldn't take back. 

She wrote him the words she wasn't aloud to say anymore, the things that were the closest things to her heart, whispers that she allowed only her favorite stuffed animal to hear. 

Brooke tucked the letter into her jean jacket and ran her fingers through her hair. After putting everything back into the cardboard box, she headed towards the door, with only one thing on her mind. 

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"Let me just go and get my tie. I'll be right out mom," Lucas said as he entered his room. 

He walked over to her dresser but was caught off guard as Brooke popped out of his closet. 

"Brooke, what are you doing here?" 

She bit her lip, embarrassed to have been caught snooping through his things. Brooke had come over to say goodbye to him but had got caught up in the past. She had been wondering to herself if he had kept the letters from her, if she had been worthy of a box the way Peyton had been. 

"I uhh..." Brooke hesitated. 

"I came over to say goodbye, I know graduation is in a few hours but I wanted a chance to talk to you alone." 

Lucas smiled and made his way over to her, grabbing her hand and pulling her towards his bed to sit down. 

"Are you okay Brooke? You look a little flushed..." 

Brooke shrugged her shoulders and smiled uncomfortably. 

"I'm just a little nervous, with my speech and all." 

Lucas nodded his head. "You'll do great Brooke, that's why we made you president." 

"I know," she said quietly. "The truth is Lucas... I came over here to..." 

Lucas raised his eyebrow. "To what Brooke?" 

Brooke shook her head and got up, not knowing what to say. "I should get going..." 

"Brooke," Lucas laughed. "What's going on?" 

She sighed and crossed her arms across her chest. "Okay Lucas," Brooke said as she took a deep breath. "I came over here because I wanted us to be honest, for once." 

"Okay." 

She could tell by the look on Lucas's face that he didn't understand what she was trying to say. So, she turned away from him and shut her eyes. 

"I packed all of my things today, I leave for New York tomorrow." 

Brooke turned around and stared at Lucas, confusion spread across his face. "I know Brooke..." 

"While I was packing, I found this box. I hid it away a few months ago, when my whole world was crashing around me. I figured that if I locked it in Rachel's closet, that it would stay hidden and that I could go on pretending." 

Brooke smiled slightly. 

"And then I thought to myself, does Lucas have a box? I mean we spent practically every day together for almost eight months. Did I get a box? Or did the stuff just little by little disappear over time?" 

Lucas stuffed his hands in his pocket and watched as Brooke walked across his room and into his closet. She looked up at the top shelf and she could see Peyton's box. It was there, just like it had been over a year ago. 

"Peyton got a box. And you have a box, I'm just wondering... Did I get one?" 

"Brooke..." Lucas stuttered. 

He wasn't sure what to say and he didn't know where she was getting. 

Why were they arguing about a simple box? 

Brooke smiled. 

"It's okay Luke. I get it, I've always gotten it. That's why you being with Peyton now is okay. Because I've known this whole time, that I never held your heart. It's always been her. It's always going to be her." 

Lucas struggled with words, trying to figure out what he wanted to say to her. He knew nothing he could say would make any of this better for her and knew that trying would only cause more damage. 

So he stayed quiet. 

This was the decision they had made, the three of them. 

And this time, there could be no turning back. He had to keep his promises this time, he had to protect everyone involved. 

"Goodbye Lucas," Brooke said as she reached up to kiss him gently on the cheek. 

She made her way towards the door and out of his room, not realizing that the final letter she had written to him, had fallen out. 

Lucas watched as the letter fell to the floor and he walked over to pick it up. He glanced at his own name written on the envelope and he hesitantly opened the letter. Sitting on his bed, he began to read his exes letter. 

He couldn't believe what he was reading, the words that for two months he had waited desperately to hear. He read that her heart had never left him, that she was scared of getting hurt and that was why she had broken up with him. Lucas read that she felt like she wasn't good enough for him and that Peyton had secretly confessed her feelings to Brooke.

Tears sprang to his eyes as he realized the pain that Brooke had gone through silently and he found himself caught between the past love that he had let slip away and the current girlfriend who depended on him to be there. 

He heard his mom laughing in the kitchen and knew that he needed to get back in there before one of them came to get him. 

Lucas found himself torn between chasing after Brooke, something he had told himself he couldn't do anymore and going to Peyton. He laid his head back onto his bed, and opened the nightstand drawer. He tucked the letter into his table, on top of all the others that she had written him and smiled sadly. 

The truth was, Brooke didn't get a box. 

He never found it in him to put her things away. 

Instead, the photo frames that had once showed pictures of the two of them, were now covered with group photos. 

The girly cd's that she had left over at his place, that he had insisted he hated were tucked away within his. 

Her favorite pajamas were still beneath his and her perfume still lingered in his dresser drawers. 

The special shampoo that she insisted would make your hair smell like orchids and coconut was still sitting in his shower, and her toothbrush was still tucked into its holder. 

On his bookshelf was the scrapbook she had made him, as were the books he use to read to her. 

Tucked in his desk were the coasters from the bar that they shared their first kiss at. 

His arm still bared the tattoo he had gotten, on their first date. 

And the eighty two letters that she had written just for him, were tucked inside of his night table. 

He had never been able to face putting the things away because he knew in doing that, meant he had to give up on them forever. 

Months ago, he hadn't been able or willing to face that. 

And although months had past in Tree Hill and he was with Peyton now, his love for Brooke hadn't disappeared as he led everyone to believe. His heart in fact had stayed the same, torn between the beautiful brunette who had captured his heart in a single glance and the curly haired blonde he had once shared such a deep connection with. 

Brooke Davis didn't have a box, but she had everything else. 


End file.
